L recruits4 GundamPQ &guild, FM6
by Thanatos-Aire
Summary: The boys come across Maple Story. Chaos ensues and Zechs is left confused and all by his lonesome self. Cussing, ref to animated violence, no pairings but brief suggestion of 1331, Prevs-era


title: L recruits4 GundamPQ &guild, FM6  
part: 1/1 complete  
date: Jan 2008

author: ThanatosAire (Airi M.)  
contact:

genre: Shin Kidou Senki Gundam Wing  
rating: PG13  
warnings: lots of language, comedy, brief suggestions of non-het, ref to animated violence, heavy jargon, ref to other games or fiction (AKA, proof of my dorkdom), post-EW/Prevs-era

cast: pilot friendship, ref to possible 1331  
notes: You will need to be familiar with the Maple Story game to understand most of this. A lot of the things aren't explained, only vaguely mentioned, so people who have never heard of MS will have problems understanding what's going on and will miss a lot of jokes. Sorry.

Anyway, so… I only started playing in December because my old computer couldn't handle the download, so I'm still kinda low-levelled but if anyone wants to play with me just leave a note with your stuff or meet up ingame: 'thanaXtosa' in Khaini, usually channel thirteen. I've got others but you have to ask for those Also, I started this before the current patch, so things might be a little different now; Maple Island has slimes in it now, for instance. Please also note that while a lot of examples were taken from personal experience, some were totally made up.

blurb: Originally, I didn't have an acknowledgement, but in the middle of writing this one of the two men who created Dungeons and Dragons died. I felt I needed to give a nod to the lovely Mr Gygax because without him this wouldn't exist. So, yeah. Even though the DnD joke had been in here since the beginning, and I hadn't known he was from around where I live (bad dork, bad – no poly-die for you), this fic is dedicated to him, the other guy, all the DnD geeks, everyone who ripped the RPG format for themselves and their players, and just dorks in general. 3

trailer: The boys come across Maple Story. Chaos ensues and Zechs is left confused and all by his lonesome self.  
disclaimer: I don't own, claim to own, or make profit off of any canon or otherwise copyrighted elements that have been borrowed without permission. MS belongs to Nexon/Wizet and all references belong to their respective owners (footnotes at end).

* * *

Duo whistled as he strolled into the conference room they had taken over for the assignment.

"Hey hey! Quat, my man, you're early."

The blond grinned up at him as he started up the computer he sat in front of. Duo slid into the seat beside him and hit the power button on his own machine. "The coffee maker was broken this morning, so I didn't have to wait in line," He held up a paper cup of his usual tea.

"Well that's cool. I wanted to show you this awesome game I found when I was going through the perp's comp files." Duo flicked open the spacenet browser and typed in a site. Quatre leaned over and copied it into his own, then raised an eyebrow.

"Smacking someone with a frozen fish?"

The braided teen laughed. "Just trust me, man. I started this last night and couldn't stop, but the server connection died. Don't worry, though, I'll make another character to play with you." He huffed and pointed to a colourful button. "Here, start downloading the program. While it's busy doing that, go in and make an account."

"And what are you going to be doing?"

"I've gotta redeem this." The twisted grin made Quatre back away a little but he obediently perused the flashed piece of plastic the size and shape of a credit card.

"Er, 'nicks'? What's that?" He busied himself with filling out the account form as Duo explained, vaguely. "Okay… And you had time to pick that up between coming here and getting kicked off the server?"

The American stuck his tongue out and waved cheerfully as Heero and Trowa entered together. "Hey guys. I sent you an email 'bout what I found last night, didja get it?"

Heero sat down across from him, Trowa at the foot of the table between them. "Do you really think we're going to be able to find anything about this guy through his video-game obsession?"

Trowa raised an eyebrow. "I think Duo had the right idea. If he spends so much time online, he's bound to have made contacts with other people. And it might give insight to how he thinks," The Japanese agent hummed something of a reply and started up his computer. "Well, I started last night when I received the email, so it's probably a moot point, Heero."

Duo laughed. "Way to go Tro. I knew you were a dork at heart."

The European calmly turned to him, put a forefinger below his eye and then stuck out his tongue.

He was falling out his chair still laughing when Milliardo and Wufei came in a few minutes later. They glanced at the other three typing away at their computers calmly and then both rolled their eyes and snorted. "Maxwell, really. If you don't stop doing drugs, the commander's going to fire you."

"Oy!"

"Duo, what do I do now?" He turned away from Wufei, who sat down across from Quatre, and leaned over to look at the blond's screen. "Click the last world. Now go to… I dunno, it doesn't really matter. But I'll meetcha in the same channel. There, now you gotta make the character."

He turned back to his own computer and hurriedly went to catch up.

Milliardo frowned from the head of the table where he was checking his email. "What? Maxwell, you cannot honestly believe that we're going to catch this guy by playing computer games." Heero snorted and muttered something under his breath, but Trowa nudged him with a smirk.

Duo sighed dramatically and tried to explain. Wufei looked more and more against it as he opened his own email and found the link. "This looks absolutely ridiculous. People waste this much time on something so…"

"Cartoony?"

"Frivolous." He rolled his eyes though and clicked the link to start an account of his own. He looked to Heero beside him and watched suspiciously as the chocolate-haired teen rolled some stats. "Was there any research we should do beforehand?"

Heero slid him a scrap of paper. "I figured you would want to be a warrior." He took it cautiously, watching Heero's screen for a moment before realising the peculiar code written down for him was a set of guidelines he needed to follow. Wufei sighed and went back to his own computer.

"Aw, Duo, he's so cute!"

Duo laughed. "Lookit yours, man, that seedling costume really suits you." Quatre nudged him back and typed in a pert message to the other character. The other agent laughed some more and glanced up at Wufei with a snicker as he clicked off a reply.

Milliardo sighed, brushing a strand of hair back behind his ear as he stood. "I'm going to take this to Une, make sure it's in the best interests of this case." Everyone ignored him, busy taking in their respective screens. He sighed again dramatically and flounced out the door.

The five pilots were quiet for some time, the rapidfire typing the only sound in the room besides occasional snickers.

Then Trowa guffawed. "How many brothers are there?"

"Hell if I know. Just get through to Mai with as few kills as you can or you'll overshoot the level XP when you go to job-up." Duo snorted. "Hey, what the fuck does 'meh-zo-plocks' mean? This random player guy said it…"

Quatre chuckled. "Money please and thank you. Just make an angry face and walk away." Four sets of eyes peered over to give him a peculiar stare. He ducked his head and waved it off, "I used to be addicted to Gaia. Leave me alone."

Duo snorted, laughing yet again. "Man, you're a dork too! Hey Hee-man, was all that time you spent on Laptoppie during the war because you were attacking for the Horde?"

He got a glare and beamed innocently back at him but Duo collapsed into another fit of giggles when Trowa snorted and corrected, "Halo. He was obsessed with that flag game."

Wufei sniffed. "Besides, there's nothing wrong with that game. Except, of course, for the idiots who think the Alliance will lose."

When Milliardo came back to grab the website name he had forgotten to write down in his hurry to leave, Heero was the only one still at the computer: the other four were tangled up on the floor in a wrestling match arguing about Largo's teddy bear. Or something…

The man sighed yet again, shaking his head, and he left wondering why he had to get stuck with a bunch of unruly teenagers.

* * *

"Aw, but I have to go to whatsitsname… Kiernan… for my job advancement thingy."

Quatre wriggled his mouth back and forth in thought. "Well, I'm going to Henesys so why don't we meet up back at… Lilith?, it's in the middle."

Duo shrugged. "Okay. But if I get attacked by a giant slime again when I'm all alone and still only at ninth-level…"

The blond shrugged. "Then you'll die and I'll laugh." A soft snort sounded from across the table but the other three were hunched over their keyboards so they couldn't tell who it was.

It was silent in the room again for a long while. Heero huffed at one point and Quatre swore as his server died, but it went quiet again immediately and stayed that way for another hour or so. Then suddenly Duo cursed loudly, berating some noob KSer and demanding to know what the fuck "FTW" meant and why people couldn't spell out a single damn word. But then it went silent again.

Soon after, the door flung open. "I can't believe this," Milliardo stormed back inside with a growl. "Une approved this course of action!" He pointed to Duo as if it were all his fault, "This is the most asinine plan I have ever had a partner come up with. I-- What the fuck is that?"

Wufei snorted. "I do believe that is called a Wild Fireboar. If you'd care to step back, I'd like to jump over it to that rope over there without dying, thank you very much."

"Where did you find one of those?" Heero leaned over and frowned. "I don't think you're on the map."

"I know. I must have gone through a wrong portal somewhere."

Heero pointed to a pile of bones arranged on a stick, "Try that." As Wufei got lost some more, Trowa huffed and pushed back away from his computer.

"I'm stuck."

"Did you check the available quests tab?"

"No, I mean, I'm stuck." He let Duo come over across the corner and growled when the braided agent laughed. "How the hell was I supposed to know not to go to Leafre yet?"

Quatre frowned. "What?"

"He left the island. The monsters are too big for him to kill but he doesn't have enough money to buy a ticket back." Duo pointed to a portal, "By the way, you do know that you're a girl, right?"

"The clothes are more attractive." he shrugged.

"Mine's a girl," Quatre piped, "Good thing too, 'cause I'd rather look like an elf than some Fly-Fishing Robin Hood…" They ignored him.

"And the reason you haven't done the job thing at level twelve?"

"Perma-beginner."

Duo paused, blinking. He leaned back to give the fringed pilot an odd look but shook his head. "You are a strange, strange boy." He tapped the screen on an NPC and said, "I'll wire you some of the money. How much do you need still?" Duo sat back down and directed his own character over a screen. The redhead was still quiet, head ducked, so he frowned and poked him. "Tro, how much?"

"Er… about ten thousand."

"Jesus Christ. Okay…"

"I'm sorry?"

He shook his head. "No big deal. I steal all the KSers' drops so I've got enough. There. If you still can't get out, I'm afraid you'll just have to sit there until one of us comes to rescue you."

"Oh!" Quatre cooed, hands on his face. "Look, Duo, this guy's got a pet following him around!" He sighed wistfully and then clicked around on his computer for awhile. "Ni! There are wings!" He huffed and stood up. "I'm going to the store to buy some of those game cards. Anyone else want one?"

Hands went up immediately around the table and he nodded determinedly before walking out of the room like a man on a mission.

Duo laughed. "Man. One day of playing and we're already horribly obsessed."

"Speak for yourself, Maxwell," Wufei growled, smacking his keyboard with enough force to break it. "This has got to be one of the most childish, nonsensical,-- Why won't you die, you--"

Heero snickered. "Liquids or bubbles?"

"One. Damned. Bubble. Shit, now there's a green toadstool laughing at me!" He banged away with panicked determination and was surprised to find another character come up behind him and easily blast away the mushroom with a ball of magic.

"There."

Wufei turned to look at the Japanese teen incredulously but Heero was already dropping a slime bubble and walking away. "Yuy, what,"

"I'm a magician. I've been killing those things since before you left the little island."

"But… I'm a warrior. My strength is,"

"I'm higher level than you right now. It doesn't matter what your strength stat is, my attacks are still more powerful. Come help me get these firewood things after you finish the quest."

Duo shook his head and kicked at Trowa lightly. "Where you at?"

"I'm… on a giant bird." At the blank expression, he elaborated, "The ship to go back, it's still flying over."

"Well, meet me in the archer town when you get in. When Quat gets back, we can do the Save the Mochi-Making Bunny from the Evil Rabid Bats quest."

Three sets of eyes lifted to give him a questioning look. "Whaat?" he complained, sliding down in his chair. "I'm not the one who came up with the idea…"

* * *

"Ack! I got eaten by an alligator!"

Trowa frowned. "An alligator? Where are you?"

Quatre stared incredulously at his screen before replying. "I don't know. I was running through Kerning and jumped onto the sewer ledge so I wouldn't walk on people, and then I was here. There are those little green worm guys here too and I can't even hit them!"

"That's the road to the dungeon from Kerning," Duo laughed. "I was wondering where you disappeared off to. Well come on and help me get these octopuses."

"Octopi," Wufei corrected idly, not even paying attention.

He snorted. "Whatev', man. No one else in this game can spell for shit, so I don't really think it would matter if I use the wrong… suffix thingy. At least I don't say fishes, like some people."

"Well at least you know what that word means," he snorted, but noticed Trowa was glaring at the American. "You pluralise fish? I don't think I've heard you before."

Heero snorted. "Trowa puts an 's' at the end of everything. I did too when J first taught me English, it's not a big deal."

Quatre sighed. "Okay, we get it, everyone has horrible language skills. Can someone please come help me get out of here?"

The grumbling died for a moment before Heero snickered. "Solar windses," Trowa pursed his lips and kicked him hard under the table. He just smirked back at him.

When Milliardo strolled in, huffing about having to do everything himself, Duo was warbling. "Dude! I didn't know about this screen, awesome! Hey, guys, the sawhorse at the top over the octo-piiiii," he stressed, "is a portal to a hunting ground of nothing but oc's and blue mushes!"

"Congratulations, Maxwell," Heero teased.

He stuck his tongue out at him over the monitor. "Well, we need like two hundred octopus legs, and it'd be easy to just stay in here for a level or two to train. Oh, shit, Quat, watch out for the-- you threw a snail shell at him? What the fuck is wrong with you?"

"It was all I had!" he defended, "I ran out of arrows…"

"Well get out that axe you picked up, it'd be easier for you anyway; just stand on the sawhorse and whack the oc's as they go past."

Milliardo sighed heavily. "Whacking octopuses in secret passages?" He snorted, scoffing at it as he settled himself at his own computer to examine fingerprint matches.

He was startled when all five of them turned to correct him, "Octopi!"

* * *

"Yes! Ha hah, take that!"

"You levelled?"

"Damn straight I levelled," Wufei announced triumphantly. "Stupid angry ribbon pigs, I have defeated you finally!"

Heero snorted. "You didn't actually kill one, Chang, you only made it out of the maze."

He glared. "I made it through the maze from hell stock-full of Super Ribbon Pigs of doom, finished the dumb quest, and levelled up to twenty-five! I think I deserve a little more credit than that."

Duo laughed. "You're only twenty-five? Shit. I hit that last night."

Trowa rolled his eyes. "We haven't been playing for even a week, don't you think we should take a break--"

"Wait, didn't you get that quest at like twenty-two? What took you so long to finish it?" Quatre interrupted.

"It's a damned maze!" Wufei argued, "I had to find my way through!"

The other four snorted but Heero explained, "Why didn't you just look it up?"

"What do you mean?"

"You can look up those things all over the web."

There was a long pause of silence. Then Wufei stood slowly from his chair, turning to face the four of them with an unreadable expression on his face. "Injustice! You lot are nothing but a group of cheaters! How can you sit there and tell me you're better than I am when I actually earned my experience?"

Duo laughed again, not paying attention to the screen until Quatre jumped and yelped out a warning. The braided teen turned back to his computer and swore. "Die, shit, fuck! Get-- no, pots, pots! Die, pots! Fuck!" He sat back and stared at the monitor in disbelief. "Fuck."

Quatre burst out into uncontrollable laughter. "You… you… Duo! You were killed by a snail!"

"You're a thief, all that luck won't let you lose XP when you die." Trowa pointed out.

"Yeah, I know, but… Man. Shinigami felled by a lowly green garden snail. Shit."

Heero frowned. "You lose XP when you die?" Various nods answered and he hummed. "Oh."

Wufei gave him an incredulous look. "You never noticed?"

"I've never died." Again, four pairs of eyes stared up over the computers. Heero shrugged.

Duo growled. "Unbelievable! Superman in reality and in cyberspace. Bastard, c'mere, I'm gonna F5 you." He typed away madly for a moment then jerked back. "You're at the pig beach? Where the fuck is that? Man, I have been around the entire damned map except for-- Hoshit. Ro, you're not in the dungeon part yet are you?"

"Duo, it's a hidden screen," Trowa replied patiently, "Go back to the split road by Lith and use the daffodils as a portal."

"Wait for me!" Quatre yelped. "Duo, you're a horrible party leader, leaving me alone like that!"

Wufei huffed again. "You're partied?"

"Well, me and Duo are."

"Heero and I are as well."

"… You cruel, evil people. You would leave me out of this? Party me dammit before my dao finds its way into your monitor!"

Trowa chuckled a little. "Come into the same screen and I'll invite you. If you two want to delete your party, you could join too."

After a minute of silence, Quatre yelped. "You're married!"

There was a moment of stunned blinking from everyone else before Heero growled. "Trowa and I did it for the experience. There are quests that can only be done by--"

"You didn't invite us to the wedding ceremony, you jerk!" the blond interrupted. Wufei and Duo turned to stare at the pair in disbelief. Trowa ducked his head and flushed a little.

"Actually, we're still engaged. Heero hasn't finished--"

"Well I would have if you hadn't've sold the damn things in the store!"

"I asked if you needed anything because I was cleaning out my storage locker and you said no." he shot back.

As they argued, Wufei turned to the pair across the table and questioningly jerked his head towards the other two. Duo shrugged, hands thrown up in confusion but he was grinning manicly. Quatre clapped a hand over his mouth to cover the chuckles before he noted quietly, "They act like an old married couple already in real life, do you think--"

When Milliardo attempted to come in from his lunch break, he found Wufei sitting at his computer shaking with deep belly-laughs as Heero sat on Quatre tickling him mercilessly. Trowa was pinning him down with Duo trying to pull the two off but was unsuccessful due to the uncontrollable chortles that wracked his body.

* * *

"Arg." Duo waved as the door opened but was too busy setting up breakfast on the sideboard to notice who it was. He pulled food out of the bags from the grocery store he had stopped at earlier and shoved it all into some semblance of an order.

"Wow, Maxwell bought junkfood, who'd've thunk?"

"Jesus Christ!" he yelped, whirling, to glare at Heero who was pointedly not standing between him and the door. "Give a guy a fuckin' heartattack, wouldja?" After a moment, he huffed and stuck out his tongue. "What, no wifey today?"

The Japanese agent scowled. "Trowa is not my wife, and no. He was staying with Catherine for the weekend so he won't be here until later."

Quatre snorted as he came into the conference room fully. "Ah. Another week of playing video games… Happy Monday all!" He perused the food Duo had brought and grabbed a sticky cinnamon bun before settling down at his computer station.

"Don't look at me," came Wufei's tired voice from the doorway, "I've got a serious case of the Mondays this morning."

"Aw, poor Fei." Duo cooed, holding out a cinnamon roll dripping with icing.

He went to take it but was caught up in a massive bearhug from behind before he could. "Better?" Trowa asked, half a smirk playing on his face as he released him and stole his breakfast.

"Cad! You would attack me from behind and then run off with my sticky bun? Dishonorable cur…" The taller teen just smiled and took a slow, teasingly dramatic bite out of the pastry as he sat.

Duo elbowed Heero, "Hey man, don't go and kill Fei, a'ight?"

"For what?"

"Well 'cause he got a good morning hug from your wife before you did, duh."

Groans sounded from around the room. "Duo, really," Quatre admonished, "It's just part of the game."

"We're still never living this down, are we?" the redhead asked.

"Never." He grinned, handed Heero his breakfast and shooed him off to take Wufei's to him. "So anyway, over the weekend I was playin', not this character 'cause I have another one from before, y'know? Anyway, apparently, half those quests we got for the dungeon… We could o' done 'em like ten levels ago."

Heero frowned, logging in with one hand as held his cinnamon bun in the other. "But the dungeon's too dangerous. The creatures in there are too strong for--"

"The worst one we'd meet is a horny mushroom – don't look at me like that Fei, that's it's name! – on the way to do the flower quest and to grab the green mushroom quest. But as a party it shouldn't be too hard to kill the zombie ones, especially at our level." Duo shrugged and sat down, typing away rapidly to open the game. "I felt so incredibly dumb, man, these li'le fifteen-levels had finished this crap when I hadn't."

Quatre looked around the room, as the figures on his screen did not give anything away. "So. Should we go for it? We might as well, even though Wufei is constantly stalked by the mushes."

Trowa shrugged, turning to look at Heero who exhaled sharply and turned to Wufei. The Chinese agent blinked. "Why're you looking at me? I don't know about any of this!"

Heero rolled his eyes and asked Duo, "Did you do them on your other character?"

"Yeah. Want me to show ya'll the way? Going through Henesys is easiest."

Quatre snorted. "Well, since we're on the complete opposite side of the island… Walk, cab, or scroll?"

"Walk," answered a chorus, "More XP."

It was quiet for a while until Milliardo finally came in, arms full of files and a box of evidence. He scowled, dropping his stuff with barely a glance from the younger pilots. He huffed, helped himself to a cooling cinnamon roll, and allowed himself to linger behind Heero and Wufei, watching their screens for a few moments.

"Congrats," Duo crowed, not even looking up.

The blond man snorted. "Making a level is automatic? Pssht."

Wufei glanced up from distributing his new skill points. "Oh?"

"If it were manual, you would need to have money and make sure you didn't pin from the XP, and have to go back to the jobmaster, which makes it significantly more difficult."

Heero paused, taking the time to jump onto a safe ledge so he could turn his attention to Relena's brother. "Mordor?" he asked, incredulous. Milliardo blinked, taken aback, then scoffed and stalked back to his computer. The brunet shrugged it off and went back to playing.

About ten minutes later, Duo was directing them to the upper corner of the archer town and through a portal.

"Fuck!"

"Haha, Fei died!"

"Damn fucking green mushroom! It pushed me off the ledge!"

"Well, if you had left it alone to help us kill the golem thing, you wouldn't've fallen off to get killed by said golem thing," Heero said matter-of-factly.

Wufei glared at him. "At least I picked up the weighted earrings to finish that one quest."

Trowa snorted. "Only because you got lost in the Tree Dungeon and picked up someone else's drops before getting killed by those cycloptic lizards." Dark eyes stared at him.

"You were the newb stalking me last night?"

He smirked. "You spelled 'noobish mothertrucker' wrong, you know."

Heero snorted. "You were following him around last night? You told me you couldn't play because you were at Cathy's."

"I was teaching Catherine how to play. It was her character really, but I saw Wufei and told her just to follow him around." Snickers sounded from the Quatre-and-Duo side of the table.

Wufei grumbled and managed to get back to the platform the others were waiting at. "Winner, can you kill that snail on the next ledge so we can jump and talk to the guard?"

An arrow flew across the screen and the snail keeled over with a squeak. Duo chuckled. "Man, how sadistic is it to feel giddy at that noise?"

"Salad? Where the hell do you find salad?" Trowa wondered.

"I was worried more about why she'd want to eat the wings of some killer bats," Heero commented.

He rolled his eyes. "It doesn't really matter why we need the items, but where to get them." The Japanese teen raised an eyebrow at him and opened his mouth to retort when Wufei interrupted knowingly.

"Anyway, we going in?"

Everyone looked around the table and shrugged. "Dungeons away!" Duo cried and his character leapt off the platform to disappear into the portal leading to Sleepywood.

* * *

"What. The. Fuck. Man!"

"What is it this time, Maxwell?" Milliardo sighed.

He caught the top of the braided head shaking over the computer monitors, but had to wait for a verbal reply from Quatre to get any answer. "This is what, the fifty-bajillionth boar we've killed, and still no Cinderella slipper thing? This bites."

"At least we've levelled thanks to it," Heero pointed out, even though he was pausing to stretch and crack his knuckles. Trowa let his head loll back, exposing his throat and forcing his adams apple to jut out, then rolled his head, stretching his neck. There was a series of pops and Wufei and Quatre both flinched.

"Please don't do that," the Chinese teen asked. "It's bad enough I have to sit next to Yuy who does it with his hands constantly, but… Barton…" He only got a small smirk and a shrug.

Trowa hung his head and began rubbing at the nape of his neck though, "How about we take a break from the boars and finish off that mask monster quest in the excavation site?"

"I don't have any more slots in my inventory," Heero argued, "and I can't drop anything because they're all quest items."

"So?" Duo's head peeked over the monitor to raise an eyebrow at him.

Wufei shook his head. "Yuy has an obsession with only killing things he can get the drops from."

"That's not a bad thing," Quatre sided. "Sell the drops and buy potions for the magic he needs, it makes sense."

Wufei sighed and shook his head. "I have more slots than you, I will pick up the drops and buy you your pots. Let's go, I'm sick of looking at these wrinkled-bottomed hyena-haired wild jumping pigs."

Snorts sounded from across the table and Milliardo shook his head yet again, trying not to pay attention to the asinine comments the boys were making. But then Duo's guffaw again distracted him from his work.

"Dude, what the fuck?" He stood up and had to go across the room to sit on the sideboard, face red with laughter. "This is so messed up… Y'know how you ain't s'pose to swear or nothin'?"

"Did you just cuss out a twelve year-old, Maxwell?" Wufei admonished.

"You have to be thirteen or older to play," Heero reminded.

Trowa snorted, nudging him with an elbow. "Like that's going to stop anybody."

Duo shook his head. "That's the point! I wasn't swearin' and it said I was! It won't take the words 'dropped' or 'pigs', a little window comes up saying it's vulgar and it won't post it."

"What? But it'll take 'hell'!" Quatre replied, typing away madly. "… It says… What? Mentioning the Spice Girls by name is akin to cursing? Who wrote up that filter?"

"Hn. It didn't take 'ambushed' once, when I was talking to someone before." He turned to Trowa. "Have you noticed anything?"

There was a pause before he moved one shoulder up in a slight shrug. "It'll take a lot of derogatory names pretty easily."

Duo shook his head some more, coming down from the sudden high. "This is bullshit," he singsonged.

Turning back to his own computer, which pointedly was not the game, Milliardo murmured in agreement.

* * *

"Nooo!"

Duo flung himself off the chair to sprawl on the floor. Quatre offered a sympathetic expression. "At least you get to try again."

"I was one away! I only needed one more damned crystal!"

"What happened now?" Heero asked as he and Trowa shuffled in. They were carrying bags of takeout that they set on the sideboard.

Duo twitched.

Quatre snorted and stood to help them unpack the food. "He was trying to do the quest for the second job. He got killed and has to do it all over again."

"Heero did that this morning before we came in." Trowa shrugged. "I haven't hit thirty yet, but it doesn't matter because I didn't make the first job advancement."

Wufei waltzed in with an evil smirk. "I… have finally… scrounged up my last goddamned garnet ore." The others looked at him. "I still need that garnet to get the sauce to finish the dinner quest from like level twenty-two."

Duo laughed and pulled himself up off the floor. "Didn't you get those from the security dude? That's where I got mine."

"I think I received topaz or something. Shut up! I'm going down to finish that quest and will meet back up with you guys later."

Quatre nodded. "I'll come with. I still need some pig heads or whatever, but maybe I could buy them in the marketplace."

"I've got a few left over," Heero replied. "Trowa and I were training in the pig beach for a while, remember?"

"Okay, cool thanks. Need anything back?"

He shrugged. "Tro still needs some more blue bubble things. He hates going down in that subway." Trowa vehemently spat something about 'fucking blue pogo-gloops' and the others stared at him for a moment, surprised. Then Wufei snorted.

"So what did you pick up?"

Heero calmly handed out tea and coffee with simple bagels. "Sangers for lunch, nothing special. But we did find more NX cards." Hurrahs sounded and the three other agents jumped up to surround the pair.

"All right! Knew I loved ya guys f'r something. Hey Quat, ya wanna make a store with me?"

Trowa cocked his head slightly at Duo with a mocking frown. "You mean you don't love us for our outstanding beauty and skills?" Heero nudged him in the ribs with an elbow, a pointed glare directed to him as well, but the pilots just laughed.

The door opened slowly and a familiar blonde head poked in. Milliardo sighed in relief and came inside the room. "I see you five aren't playing for once."

"Breky break!" Duo hummed around his mouthful of lox. The Chinese teen behind him snorted and went to sit back down at his computer with his own sesame-seed bagel and cream cheese.

Milliardo shook his head. "Anyway, I think we've spent too long wasting our time on this dead-end of a research ploy. I've set up a meeting with Une to show her how little you've gotten done these past few weeks, especially on this case, and--"

"Whoa whoa whoa there!" Duo barked. "We've gotten plenty. Don't we, Ro?"

The brunet nodded and passed the Peacecraft heir a file. "We've been in contact with several people who've partied or befriended the perp, and have made contact with someone who seems to be a right-hand or at least an associate of some kind."

"You can't talk to him any more than just 'made contact'?"

"Her." Heero corrected, "There are plenty of female gamers. And no, not yet. We're not at a high enough level to join the guild she leads and there's little way to converse with her outside of the guild quests she manages."

The taller soldier sighed, obviously understanding that that meant the boys were going to spend more time on the game. Duo grinned and chirped, "Cheer up, Ugly," as he patted his shoulder.

He bristled. "Maxwell, where do you get off calling--"

"Ah don't worry, not everyone's as pretty as Tro." Quatre snickered as said redhead ducked under Wufei's good-natured swat. Heero snarled and advanced on the braided teen. "Sorry, sorry!" Duo yelped as he grabbed Milliardo and pulled him towards the door, Heero threatening to smack him upside the head. "Geesh, didn't peg ya for bein' so possessive over the wife."

"Maxwell!" came a chorused growl.

Duo snorted as he pushed Milliardo out of the room. "Tro started it, I have to finish it!" he retorted. "Anyway," The American turned his voice into a rough whine, "Master Leet One, Junpei must return Rent-a-Zilla or lose deposit!"

Heero laughed at the blond's resulting expression of indignance and let them go with a wave.

* * *

"Ta da!"

"Aw!" Quatre gushed. "You got a pet finally?"

Duo grinned proudly. "Yep. I finally decided that I should be able to take care of one. Y'know, 'cause ya gotta buy it food and train it and everything… Besides, I was waitin' for a special kind to be released, and, well… Ta da!"

Heero looked over the top of his monitor. "Why, of all things, did you get that for a pet?"

Trowa and Wufei nodded in agreement. "I would have figured a dragon to tease Chang," the redhead commented, receiving a half-hearted glare.

"Or the mini Grim Reaper," Quatre opined.

Duo waved it off. "It was too good of a joke to pass up. I mean, c'mon. They only have badgers for a limited time? I hadta get one!"

"Why?" Heero asked, "and why did you need to name it… Francis?"

The American laughed. "Francis. Yeah. I love you, Francis, you're such a good minion! Who's a good minion, Francis, who's a good minion? You are!" he cooed to the screen. The others watched in disconcertment as Duo's character laid on the ground and 'petted' the badger.

"Speaking of pets," Wufei addressed quietly, "Do you think I could get one now? A dragon, I mean? I don't know what to do for it yet but…"

Heero glanced over at the other three quickly as if asking permission before he set his hand on the shoulder of the pilot beside him. They had all noticed the way Wufei had fawned over the little shadows. "I'm sure it would be all right. We're decently high levelled, I don't think it would be a problem. But, you do realise that they only live for three months, right?"

He sighed, biting his lower lip, then nodded. "Nah, actually," Duo corrected, once again Knower of All Things Maple, "They don't, like, disappear, or nothin'. You just gotta revive 'em with some special water junk." Wufei smiled in appreciation.

"Speaking of dragons," Quatre interjected, giving the Chinese agent an apologetic smile, "How about going to Leafre now?"

"You want to go now?" the Japanese agent asked, slightly worried. They would have to battle against dragons, so the timing seemed really awkward.

Wufei growled. "I'm not a baby," he snapped. "You don't have to coddle me about some asinine little thing like killing my wife's clan symbol." Heero opened his mouth for a moment before glancing at Trowa, who stood without hesitation and rounded the table. The redhead wrapped the youngest pilot up in a huge bearhug, and murmured in his ear, trying to explain without over-sentimentality that they only cared about him.

He nodded again and they took off to Leafre, back in El Nath, where Trowa had gotten stuck way back when they were still just starting. It had been weeks since then…

Milliardo stalked in some twenty minutes later, files and papers in his arms. He silently glared, turning it up for Duo since it was the American who had convinced Une that they needed to stay in the game with his outstandingly erratic explanation. He plopped down at the head of the table where his computer was set up and he pointedly went about other more orthodox ways of finding the perp.

As Wufei inquired a certain NPC about getting a dragon and then searched the Cash Shop, Quatre and Duo were a screen or two over attempting to kill the bouncing pompoms that spit hairballs at them. Heero and Trowa had been left in Orbis to peruse the guild headquarters but were heading over when Duo began laughing again.

"There's some poor newb girl in here looking lost as hell," he explained. "Must've taken that quest just like Tro did without realising level ten wouldn't suffice."

Quatre shook his head and began typing, talking to the other character and offering her some extra drops she would need for future quests.

"We'll be there in a minute," Heero announced. "Tro and I are almost to… Your dragon is gorgeous, Chang."

"Thank you." he replied solemnly, leading the way back to where the other two were.

Trowa tilted his head as he viewed the pet info. "You didn't name it after your Gundams?"

"Meiran was my wife's name. It suits the dragon more than Nataku or the official names of my suits would have." Quatre squealed as they entered and he saw the new pet for the first time. He opened his mouth to agree on the cuteness of Wufei's charge when Trowa suddenly gave a half-snort half-cough.

"That's the newb?"

"Yeah man, why?" Duo peered around his computer as the taller pilot clicked away.

Heero frowned. "You just invited her to the party?"

He smirked. "She'd flay me alive if I didn't." After a moment of blank looks, Trowa sighed and shook his head. "Look at her name…" He typed in a quick message and hit an expression key.

"Lady Une?" came a unison of squawks.

Duo rolled out his chair yet again and laughed curled up on the floor. "Oh man! She looked interested when I was explaining the thing to her, but…"

Milliardo raised an eyebrow, coming back into the conversation. "What about the commander?"

Wufei turned his monitor slightly so the blond could view the barely-not beginner character. "That's the Lady."

"… The commander is playing this wretched waste of time?" He blinked once, twice, then a third time, before standing. "Maxwell!" he roared. "This is all your fault!"

* * *

"Egh! Watch out for the killer cavemen."

"Are there dragonflies, too?" someone snickered.

Duo chuckled. "Yeah but no magickal barrels of health or stats." A round of disappointed "aww"s sounded. "I know. Tear…"

Some hours later while back in Victoria, Wufei was attacked yet again by a green mushroom. He held onto the cap despite being offered a trade from someone who needed it for a quest.

Lunch and a raucous version of "Eric the Half a Bee" later found Milliardo popping aspirin as Sally wandered in to ask about the game Une had mentioned.

"Be sure to sign up under the last world, and then come into this channel." Duo said, scribbling the site and brief instructions on a post-it. "We'll head on back to the island and party you, okay?"

"There's a limit to six people in a party," Heero pointed out.

He made a face. "Oh yeah. Damn. Well… I dunno. We'll kick Une-babe out and take you, then when you log off we'll invite her back."

Trowa snorted. "Why don't we just split up again? You and Quatre leave, start your own party, and take the girls."

"Oh sure, we get stuck with the newbs!" Quatre shot good-naturedly. Heero offered him a wolfish grin over his monitor.

"You two are more patient and better at explaining things than the three of us," Trowa replied with a slight shrug.

"Oh for the love of space," Milliardo cried, "Please tell me you're here to say the perp offed himself and we can stop this nonsense!"

They all turned to the doorway where Lucrezia stood looking sheepish. "Er, actually, I was wondering where to find this game that…" He flung himself out of the chair to the floor in a most unprincely manner. Wufei began to snicker uncontrollably.

Heero sighed and got up to drag the mumbling, incoherent agent up into his chair. "How about we make a guild of our own. We'll split up: Tro and I with Sally, Duo and Quatre with Noin, and Chang can take Une since she's already twenty-something now. That way we're partied but still all connected."

Quatre slid his hand into the air slowly. "Er… aren't you only allowed one guild? If we make our own, we won't be able to infiltrate the second-in-command's and get information for the case."

"Right," Duo agreed, tapping his chin with a finger thoughtfully.

"Eh," Heero looked down at the blond he was standing behind. Milliardo was tugging at his hair, mumbling under his breath about going insane and something about 'paper and dice'. "I hacked the account server. She's got another character, a little higher levelled than ours but not in a guild. We'll invite that character into ours."

Duo razzed him. "You got into the account server? Man, didn't I ask you earlier if you could hack the game?"

"You wanted more money to buy that scroll. That's on a separate server, one that's heavily shielded from hackers." He received knowing looks from everyone in room. Heero sighed and shrugged, "I gave you what was left for you to get it though, didn't I?"

He waved it off. "I figured you owed it to me since I helped you build that army of chocobo."

Wufei jerked to glare at him. "I knew you cheated! There was no way you could have had that many eggs,"

"Officially inbred?" Quatre joked.

"O' course," Duo scoffed with a grin.

Sally raised an eyebrow. "Eggs? You can hold more than one Yoshi?"

Duo turned to blink at her, as did the rest of the pilots. "Ha hah, you're a dork too! Woot!"

* * *

When Milliardo got home later that day, after picking up his ulcer medication, he finally decided to check his answering machine. He had not done so since practically the beginning of the assignment since he was so busy picking up teh slack from the other pilots, and he was worried there was no more memory to store messages.

"…? This thing can hold that many?" he muttered as the red number flashed. He hit the button and found Relena's voice cheery as she asked, "Heero mentioned this computer game he's been working on for Preventers. We don't see each other much as you know, but we are friends and I was wondering if you could tell me the name of it so I could play. That way we could spend some time together, you know?"

He growled, popped one of the tablets, and went to the next message. "Merquise? Catalonia. Your sister's been wondering about some video game and if you don't ring me back with information about it, you're a dead man, Zechsy."

"Er… hi. This is Hilde Schbeiker… You probably don't remember me but I can't seem to get Duo to pick up his damned vidcom. Could you tell me or ask him to tell me about this RPG thing he's spending so much time at work for? My number is…"

He whimpered, holding his head, and pressed the button for the next one. Obviously he would have been better off just deleting all the messages instead of listening to them… "Hey Zechs, it's Syl' Noventa. Would you happen to know anything about why Trowa and Yuy joke about being married online?"

Milliardo left to grab the wine from his fridge. He drank straight from the bottle, listening with half an ear to a dozen or so calls from random Preventers agents who wanted to know about the damned game. "'M gonna kill that Maxwell brat…"

"Hey man, it's your favourite halfling rogue. You didn't show for last week's Chthulu game. Next time's suppose to be your night to GM so call back soon please and thank you? I've got this great adventure with Grendel planned out to cover you if you can't make it. And what's this we hear about you leaving the White Wolf group for some dumb vid-game? Paper and dice, man, paper and dice."

Before the answering machine could shut off, he sat down at his personal computer and sighed. Then he opened his mail, searched back a few months, and opened the link.

"Frozen fish? Gah, this had better be good."

* * *

owari

.

Allusions (in order of appearance):

--Maple Story – (maplestory.) (the game they're playing the whole time, in case you didn't catch it ;) --Gaia – I used to be addicted to Go Gaia Online, but it's gotten horribly commercial lately :gonk: You can catch me on TheLadyNanashi among others () --Horde/Alliance – ref to World of Warcraft. I actually don't play, sorry. () --Halo's flag game – I can just imagine them watching RvB… The flag, the flag! (, rvb.) -Largo's teddy – ref to MegaTokyo comics. It's actually Piro's that Largo stole during Capture the Flag. () --Case of the Mondays – ref to Office Space movie Dude, the squirrels were married and it's my red stapler. Fuckin' Xerox machine. --Mordor – an old dumb little comp game where making a level was a pain in the absolethe. --Master Leet One/Rent-a-zilla– another ref to the MegaTokyo comics. I 3 Junpei the Punk Ninja --Francis the Minion – ref to Dungeons and Dragons new editions clip "The Tiefling and the Gnome" (/default.asp?xdnd/toon/20071219a) --Cavemen and dragonflies – Might and Magic IX. Still haven't crossed that damned mountain ; --Eric the Half a Bee – from Monty Python. Enough said, right? --Chocobo – the birds from the Final Fantasy games --Officially inbred chocobo – ref to VG Cats comic about breeding chocobo for colours () No, I don't have the teeshirt yet X( --Yoshi – the little (usually green) dino from Mario Brothers. In Yoshi's World for the SN you could only pick up one egg if I remember correctly --Halfling rogue – ref to DnD, it's a type of character --Chthulu game – there's an HP Lovecraft TableTop-RPG surrounding this character --Grendel – the monster from the Beowulf epic, I think there's an RPG for this too but I'm sure somewhere down the line it's been shoved into another TableTop somewhere --White Wolf – the company that publishes the vampire LARP (live-action role-play) games, there are also werewolves in some of them () (You can do this one TableTop too, but it's a little more difficult) 


End file.
